i

sometimes even i

              his best friend
can't distinguish the rumors
from truth
maybe jack mckumby’s life should just be left to myth
born of muddled minds and small-town jealousy

all i can tell you
is that back in the day
he was the freckled-speckled-teenaged
neighborhood daredevil
son of a fishmonger
who was always
tempted by any challenge we could concoct

on a dare and a flimsy promise of three quarters
he once climbed up to a high limb of the giant oak
at the end of our street
and just for laughs
shimmied out and straddled the precarious end
violently shaking it
alarming even us wagering onlookers forty feet below
as he hooted and yipped like kubrick's a-bomb cowboy

ii

jack mckumby’s soul grew to the size of the moon
inheriting all her weight and envy
floating unfettered by gravity
easing into the great industry of celestial sea
becoming a self-sustaining entity
in an endless formula of cosmic re-birthing

there was a time i looked up to him
but not in the way
one does searching for answers

iii

sure he once leapt from a moving chevy caprice
in jay portia’s alley on another goad
i know
i was there
i was behind the wheel pushing insanity passed 30
as randy and freddie egged him on from the back seat

with my t-shirt wrapped around
his bleeding arm
he still managed to bring
a sweaty bottle of orange crush
up to his thirsty lips
as we waited in the ER for stitches

iv

and if i could tame a wild stallion
and if i could turn a blue sky into marble
and if i could catch the hail mary
and if i could re-name galileo's moons
and if i could wear the vestments of integrity
and if i could believe that it was all wrong
i’d gladly pay the toll for jack mckumby’s soul

v

and then there was the time he lit up a joint
in our lady of the rosary's confessional
defiantly blowing smoke through the screen
into father gentry’s face as he doled penance

i waited in a back pew until the riled priest
quickly appeared from the mysterious curtain
cursing in his own church
as jack all but tripped running out
doob dangling from his bottom lip

both of us giggling in hysterical rain
as dogmatic threats echoed from blocks away

and how many times jack would run through old man
ennio’s vegetable garden grabbing as much fruit
as he could carry
only to drop it all to his shoes
to taunt the old man
making obscene gestures from a safe distance
after ol’ ennio turned beet as his beefsteaks
his barrel chest heaving
wobbly legs unable to catch the boy
breathlessly cursing in a bizarre mixture of
sicilian, english and nasal grunts

of course, now that i'm mulling on it
those weren't dares
there was bad blood
between families
the full story was never revealed to me
but i knew it involved ennio's young wife 
and the fish market

and as for the other rumors that have
circulated through the years
well, i refuse to repeat them
because i believe they’re
just exaggerations and mean-spirited lies

vi

now i haven’t heard from jack in over twenty years
but today in the online sunday edition
i’m reading a follow-up about that nautical disaster
that occurred in the gulf recently
you may remember it
anyway at the end of the article
i find myself foraging through
a list of the lost
and then there it is: john j. mckumby

i wave my wife over and show her
we sort of shake of heads
wondering if indeed it is our jack

now there was never any official obituary
at least not one we could find
maybe because he no longer had family here

but later that afternoon
when we were walking along the waterfront
we veered off the walkway and took to the warm sand
as the wind quieted

while coastal waves methodically massaged the narrow beach
a large wayward swell rushed and deposited
a spotted trout at our feet
it’s eyes in an open stare

we studied the freckled body
and thought of old jack
i tried tossing it back
but its body turned sideways
its fate already delivered

a sea unable to hold his congested soul

Dan Sicoli lives between two Great Lakes in New York State where he co-edits Slipstream. He will have a new poetry collection out from Ethel Press in 2026. A three-time Pushcart nominee, he's had poems placed in Abandoned Mine, BlazeVOX, dadakuku, Evening Street Review, Hellbender, Hobo Camp Review, Home Planet News, Loch Raven Review, Misfits, Steam Ticket, and San Pedro River Review, among numerous others. On weekends he beats on an old Gibson in a local garage rock band. <www.pw.org/directory/writers/dan_sicoli>